Animals in the Circus - Tortures and Slavery

Lets face it:

Animals in the circus don't have anything in common with their mates living in the wild.
Totally denaturalised, violently subdued to the privation of their biological and ethological needs, reduced to machines and made ridiculous for our entertainment, the only thing they know is sadness and terror.



Months of privations, mistreatments and sufferings hide behind the performances of the show.
The training methods involve frequent beatings and the privation of water and food.
To make the elephants stand on their back legs, a burning iron is pressed under their throat.
Felines get their crawls asported and their tooth filed to make them harmless.
To bend their will before the trainings start, tigers and lions are laid on the floor, they get the four legs tied together so that the animals cannot move and they are hit with clubs, until they realise that any reaction is useless.



Some animals never learn, their will is maybe too strong and they don't obey, so they die of exhaustion, of wound infections or they simply let themselves die,
so desperate and hopeless that they refuse to eat.
It's the tamer's philosophy, the animal must obey or die.

The conditions in which the animals are kept are shameful: the cages are too small (sometimes the animal cannot even stand and have to stay in the cage for up to 22 hours a day), they are routinely kept in chains, hygiene is scarce or missing, there's not enough light and the journeys are frequent and too long.

Circuses that exploit animals make lofty claims about their "educational" value and their contributions to "conservation."
But the real message that these circuses send to children is that it's acceptable to abuse animals for amusement and profit.

How can be educational and entertaining the sight of a suffering and sad animal in a cage, forced to behave so unnaturally?


Please check the following links to get a more complete and detailed knowledge on the reality of the Animals in the Circuses:

- Circuses.com
- Captive Animals - Circuses
- OIPA on Circuses
- Animal Protection Institute
- Wild At Heart
- Circus Reform Yes!
- Thailand Elephant Cruelty
- PAWS - Performing Animals Welfare Society


Circuses Petitions:

- Stop Circus Cruelty
- End the use of Wild and Exotic Animals in Circuses